Introduction to UnEdited

Writing my little dedication note on a book that I contributed a Short Story to.

Image taken by Ziyaad Plaatjes

My name is Nabihah and I'm the co-founder of iloveza.com .

Some of what you see posted on this website and on our Social Media pages is done by me and I try my best to be completely professional and edit well, etc etc.

But sometimes I like to write - just write - with no real purpose, with no hard take on grammar (although I do have a thing about making sure that there are no spelling errors) and I like to share my experiences, my thoughts which either manifest into poetry or just blabber.

I studied journalism and media, as well as marketing and english in University and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree and ever since then, sought a more professional take on writing.

In 2008, I found out about something called "blogging" and tried my hand at it, but as I used to love to put pen to paper and keep my thoughts for my eyes only, the online blogging was not something I could be consistent with: I posted now and again and remained true to handwriting.

I experienced many difficulties and life just seemed to get more gritty by the day. When my fingers did feel the need to type out something about my experiences, my mind would not correspond.

"No one needs to hear this"

"No one cares"

"What's the point of you telling the world what happened to you?"

"We didn't mean to hurt you, why are you hurting us by telling the world what we did to you"

All these thoughts and more surfaced and doubt creeped in. Soon, I stopped writing completely, even on paper.

The emotions created mountains inside of me: mountains made out of burning rock, getting hotter and hotter and I knew that there would be a day when the volcano that I created with these emotions, would erupt and that lava will either come spewing out or spill along the same mountain that it grew on and that...

That would be the end of me.

I'm dramatic sometimes. Or I jest.

But there's always truth in humour, so here I am.

UnEdited is my "blog". I typed inverted commas for "blog" as

I don't usually like to be called a Blogger

and iloveza.com is NOT a blog.

Just like those famous rants of doctors who aren't medical doctors arose, "I studied for years and years, so I demand to be called a Doctor"

... No, I did not study for years and years, I studied the right amount of years - Primary School, Secondary School, High School and University.

I studied Journalism, Media, Marketing and English as I mentioned before and I obtained my degree in my majors with the subjects that I had studied, so yes, I would like to be acknowledged in this regard.

But I am a person who likes to write, again as mentioned before, I write about nothing in particular and sometimes things in particular and I decided that UnEdited (Let's be technical and explain this - I am the Editor of iloveza.com but now I'm writing with no one editing my work, hence UnEdited) is my Blog within our Business Website: iloveza.com

So this is my introduction... weird, as I had already started sharing my works, be it reviews, poetry, etc under this section and now after a long time, I am doing an introduction.

But this is it.

This is my outlet and this is me trying to be brave and trying to stop those nagging thoughts of "what if someone sees this and is offended by what I say".

We write to find ourselves, we write to "download" our feelings and experiences and either try to make sense of them or just to let go. We write what we know and we write what we love. We share it, to find others like us, we share it in hopes to teach others and we share in order to find a community in which we can learn as well as grow.

As much as I hope that I will be consistent with this, in order to get my writing out there and in hopes to find others to learn from, I hope that somehow something of mine inspires you.

**** Please give me credit if I inspire you, I would appreciate it.****

Too many times iloveza.com and the social media platforms that we have: @ilovezacom "inspires" others and we see this, but they don't like to give us credit, which is probably a story for another day. :) (Exhibit A #iloveza❤️🇿🇦 :D )

#LetYourStoryBeHeard

If there are certain mistakes or viewpoints, please note that this is because my work has been unedited and it's entirely my thoughts or opinions and do not reflect those of iloveza.com's.

She is an Award-Winning Entrepreneur, Change Agent, Published Contributing Author, Journalist, Marketing and Social Media Specialist, a Bachelor of Arts graduate, and has been writing since the age of 9.

Nabihah is passionate about Brand Awareness and Brand Loyalty and uses her knowledge in these fields together with her copywriting, editing and proof-reading skills to bring brands to life.